Wednesday, May 30, 2012

Say What!: Only the rich will be able to go to college in the future?

On Yahoo today they had an article about what college tuition costs will be in 18 years or the school year 2029-2030.  Now, I expected prior to clicking on the article for the numbers to be high.  But just how high they were truly shocked me.  Here are the numbers:

For a public college or university the average in state tuition for one year of classes will be $41,228.

For a public college or university the average out of state tuition for one year of classes will be $71,373.

Now those two are warm ups for the real big shock:

For a private college or university the average tuition for one year of classes will be $92,869!

Yes you read that right.  It will cost nearly $100,000 a year for someone to attend a private 4 year college in the year 2029.  So for the standard 4 years of study to obtain a bachelors degree, someone will have spent $400,000 or the equivalent of an upscale home.  That is just insane.




As a father of two children, ages 4 and 2, I know that the day will come when they will each be ready to go to college.  Right now I have just begun to think about that and it has not really become too much of a concern to me just yet.  But very soon, sooner than I would like, it will indeed have to be something I not only think about, but also plan for.  When I look at these numbers, my mind kind of freaks out.  It starts calculating the cost for 4 years at an in state school, about $160K.  Then it multiples it by 2 and comes up with about $320K in total cost.  Again, that is a mortgage!

It is already common knowledge that college tuitions have increased at a rate much greater than inflation over the last several years.  Even now, with all the economic strife we find ourselves in as a nation, the universities are all considering and some even enacting tuition hikes.  But that begs the question of why.  Why has the cost of tuition gone up at such an incredible rate over the last several years?  Are the increases due to increases in operating costs?  Is it due to increases in the salaries of professors, administrators, and the chancellors?  Is it due, in the case of public universities, to decreases in state funding? 

I mean there must be a logical reason for these hikes, right? 

Like much in life, the reason for these increases remain a mystery.  But for a parent like myself I just don't seem to buy the party line and really want to know where all this tuition goes.  It has been shown that more people with college degrees or at least some college experience outnumber the non-college people in the ranks of the unemployed currently.  So what is the benefit of college exactly?

It has been beaten into us culturally that only with a college degree can we be any kind of success.  As my wife is fond of saying, "College degrees have become the new high school diploma." .  This is very true I think.  Sadly so. 

So where does that leave me in relation to my two boys?  Well, I know college will be probably a requirement more or less, much like it is today, when they turn 18.  I also know that my retirement funds and possibly much of mine and my wife's future earnings may be going into some sort of college savings for my boys.  And I know that as of right now I am skeptical if the cost is really worth it in the end. 

If my boys choose college, I will do all I can to support them.  With my wife and I both carrying pretty hefty student loan debt, I don't want to see my boys have to do the same.  It is just so disheartening to see how high the cost of an education will be when they are ready to go. 

When will we all come to a point when we say enough is enough in relation to the cost of an education?  When will these private universities price the middle class right out of college? 

These are important questions and ones we all should be asking and being honest with ourselves when it comes to the answers. 




Source: Yahoo

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